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Portrait of Isaac Levitan
Vasily Polenov • Painting, 1891, 67×54 cm
Description of the artwork «Portrait of Isaac Levitan»
In the early 1880s, the leadership of the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture was forced to fire a heavy drinker Alexey Savrasov and student Levitan, his best student, was thinking to leave school. However, having learned that the artist Polenov, a visitor from St. Petersburg who has recently returned from long overseas travel- Levitan became interested and decided to postpone the departure.
Levitan was right: he and his friend, a spontaneous impressionist "Kostya" Korovin became the favorite students of Polenov, who headed the still-life workshop. Suppose that in the works of Polenov there was not that shrill lyricism and the ever-turning soul of aching melancholy, which Levitan so valued Savrasov, but Polenov knew a great deal about the chemistry of colors, about their interaction, about the influence of time and the sun on them. Polenov was an outstanding colorist. His conviction that the colors, if possible, should remain clean and no need to mix in them the excess "blackness and dirt," was a revelation for Levitan. Polenov, who lived in Paris for several years, told him about the Barbizonians and the Impressionists. In Levitan's landscapes, too, it became less reddish-brown and more bright shades.
Over time, Levitan and Korovin became welcome guests of the Polenovs' house. Their former teacher arranged in his "watercolor of the morning": friends-artists were invited there, worked with a pen, watercolor or pastel, posed for each other in turn. Levitan at such "evenings" and "mornings" was a favorite model: endowed with a bright appearance, he more than once posed in a Bedouin costume, in a turban. After work, they gathered at the tea table, talked about art, laughed and joked.
«These sketches, sketches woke deeper pictorial interest Polenova- writes Levitan biographer Sofia Prorokov. - He looked at Levitan’s face more and more with admiration. How volatile it is! That inspired, glowing, then faded, brooding, even suffering. You will not follow these instant changes. And which of these expressions more accurately characterizes a talented landscape painter? So gradually, Polenov was born the idea of a portrait. He wrote his favorites in 1891, in the year of the rapid success of his landscapes. ”
The portrait was poetic in spirit. Hands, bright cuffs and a collar stand out sharply on a solemn black background. Dressed Levitan dandy: after the long-awaited success of his paintings, he finally could afford it. Vasily Polenov probably still remembered how once, ten years ago, his student Isaac, painfully ashamed of his own poverty, for lack of other clothes, used to wear a worn checkered jacket and short pants in winter and summer. Now the young famous artist enjoyed the coal-black frock coat sitting on it, his brown velvet eyes and dark beard piercingly white starched shirts set off, and his walking stick is amazingly matching his smart appearance. About Levitan said that he buys shoes a little smaller than his size, so that she gracefully fit the foot, and ties can tie a little dozen different ways.
A friend of Levitan, a writer and translator Tatyana Schepkina-Kupernik described the artist of the period of creation of this portrait as follows: “A very interesting matt-pale face, completely from the Velásquez portrait, slightly curly dark hair, high forehead, velvet eyes, pointed beard: a Semitic type in its most noble expression - Arabic-Spanish ... In his velvet work jackets with an open collar he was very handsome and knew this, he knew that his appearance attracted attention, and innocently cared about her: he tied a wide white tie with some special bow, etc. Here was a typical “make-up” for an artist like he is usually represented so imagine the readers of novels. "
The portrait of Polenov is psychological: in the “closed” position of Levitan it’s not only “Eastern importance” that is read (this is how he spoke Alexander Benois), not the slackness of a successful artist. On the contrary, it has some kind of internal tension, closeness, a premonition of not the happiest times - those features that were highly characteristic of the melancholic-Levitan.
Levitan was right: he and his friend, a spontaneous impressionist "Kostya" Korovin became the favorite students of Polenov, who headed the still-life workshop. Suppose that in the works of Polenov there was not that shrill lyricism and the ever-turning soul of aching melancholy, which Levitan so valued Savrasov, but Polenov knew a great deal about the chemistry of colors, about their interaction, about the influence of time and the sun on them. Polenov was an outstanding colorist. His conviction that the colors, if possible, should remain clean and no need to mix in them the excess "blackness and dirt," was a revelation for Levitan. Polenov, who lived in Paris for several years, told him about the Barbizonians and the Impressionists. In Levitan's landscapes, too, it became less reddish-brown and more bright shades.
Over time, Levitan and Korovin became welcome guests of the Polenovs' house. Their former teacher arranged in his "watercolor of the morning": friends-artists were invited there, worked with a pen, watercolor or pastel, posed for each other in turn. Levitan at such "evenings" and "mornings" was a favorite model: endowed with a bright appearance, he more than once posed in a Bedouin costume, in a turban. After work, they gathered at the tea table, talked about art, laughed and joked.
«These sketches, sketches woke deeper pictorial interest Polenova- writes Levitan biographer Sofia Prorokov. - He looked at Levitan’s face more and more with admiration. How volatile it is! That inspired, glowing, then faded, brooding, even suffering. You will not follow these instant changes. And which of these expressions more accurately characterizes a talented landscape painter? So gradually, Polenov was born the idea of a portrait. He wrote his favorites in 1891, in the year of the rapid success of his landscapes. ”
The portrait was poetic in spirit. Hands, bright cuffs and a collar stand out sharply on a solemn black background. Dressed Levitan dandy: after the long-awaited success of his paintings, he finally could afford it. Vasily Polenov probably still remembered how once, ten years ago, his student Isaac, painfully ashamed of his own poverty, for lack of other clothes, used to wear a worn checkered jacket and short pants in winter and summer. Now the young famous artist enjoyed the coal-black frock coat sitting on it, his brown velvet eyes and dark beard piercingly white starched shirts set off, and his walking stick is amazingly matching his smart appearance. About Levitan said that he buys shoes a little smaller than his size, so that she gracefully fit the foot, and ties can tie a little dozen different ways.
A friend of Levitan, a writer and translator Tatyana Schepkina-Kupernik described the artist of the period of creation of this portrait as follows: “A very interesting matt-pale face, completely from the Velásquez portrait, slightly curly dark hair, high forehead, velvet eyes, pointed beard: a Semitic type in its most noble expression - Arabic-Spanish ... In his velvet work jackets with an open collar he was very handsome and knew this, he knew that his appearance attracted attention, and innocently cared about her: he tied a wide white tie with some special bow, etc. Here was a typical “make-up” for an artist like he is usually represented so imagine the readers of novels. "
The portrait of Polenov is psychological: in the “closed” position of Levitan it’s not only “Eastern importance” that is read (this is how he spoke Alexander Benois), not the slackness of a successful artist. On the contrary, it has some kind of internal tension, closeness, a premonition of not the happiest times - those features that were highly characteristic of the melancholic-Levitan.
